Home
by planet p
Summary: AU; Jarod and Ethan visit Bobby's 'hometown.' WARNINGS: slash, incest, language, graphicness. Complete: continued in Leaving home.
1. Chapter 1

**Home** by planet p

**Disclaimer** I don't own _the Pretender_ or any of its characters.

**Author's Note** Some text is repeated from other stories, though it originally came from this story! Please don't report!

**Warnings** M/M (slash), incest, language.

* * *

**A guide to recurring Origina****l Characters (and name changes):**

Poni, also Chelsea (e.g. from _The day job; Once more, for science _etc_)_, and Holly (e.g. from _Alternate Reality, or Monica's World_);

Theresa, also Amanda (e.g. from _The day job, Once more, for science _etc);

Hyacinth, also Ignacia (from _The day job; Once more, for science _etc), Lupe (e.g. from _Finding Bobby: Book of Monsters and Geniuses_), and Perfecta (e.g. from _Alternate Reality, or Monica's World_).

Ignore this if you want!

* * *

It could have been just another business card. An easy shell white, expensive crisp texture, neat gold lettering. Except that it wasn't.

Ethan was carsick. If a card could think, this one would pout and think, _Aww…_ Bleary carsick eyes watched the card. The gold words shifted sharply upon the card, jumpy. Ethan read the words in his head. _Where's my Betty?_ He flipped the card, annoyed. He squinted down at a short sequence of numbers in confusion.

"It's a postal code," Jarod informed him from eyeing the road ahead of him. "Nebraska," he added.

* * *

Ethan keyed in the words _postal code_ and then the code and sat back, eyeing the screen. Ethan leant into the laptop and made a face.

_Misery NB_

The word stared back with an ill satisfaction.

He returned to the search engine and typed in _Misery, Nebraska_. An index of search results listed themselves down the browser window in order of relevance. He clicked one of the links.

It was a tourism website. The website described Misery as a small farming community.

Ethan pressed the back icon and scrolled down the multitude of listings until he came upon a website of interest. He clicked on the link and frowned at the archiving of an article dated back in the middle late 1970s.

* * *

Opposite him, Jarod slipped into a seat.

"What is this about?"

Jarod's eyes found Ethan quickly.

Ethan watched him, his eyes hard, demanding an answer.

It would be no use to try to dodge this. "The card. It's a message."

Ethan laughed shortly.

"Ethan, he knew things," Jarod began.

Ethan did not know what he meant. His toffee eyes said so.

Jarod pulled the laptop around and peered into the screen. He shut his mouth. He said nothing.

* * *

"Who?" Ethan asked, uncomfortable. The road ran away behind them.

"I think," Jarod said carefully, "I think it's from Alex."

Ethan made a noise in his throat that might have been laughter.

Alex was dead.

* * *

If the tourism website had mentioned dumpy Ethan thought that they would have at least been honest. The road sign announcing the town limits boasted a population of 800. Jarod, of course, had visited before.

Ethan diverted his eyes to the side window and caught sight of the back of the sign. It read: _Goodbye to Misery! Welcome to Happiness! F*ck yeah!_

_To the Driver: PEDAL TO THE METAL!_

He laughed silently.

* * *

The woman behind the counter squealed as her eyes landed on Jarod. "Agent Cross!" she yelped.

Ethan grimaced in distaste.

Jarod fixed an agreeable look to his face.

"Poni!" the woman chimed, hopeful and embarrassed.

Jarod nodded. "Poni," he repeated. He extended a hand.

Poni hurriedly reached out her own hand and they shook hands.

"It's, ah, it's Jarod actually."

"Oh," Poni said. She shifted behind her counter and then she smiled. "Unofficial business?" she said in a low, knowing voice.

"Ah-" Jarod grinned. "Yeah."

Poni nodded.

* * *

Cutter's had been renovated sometime between Jarod's first visit and this second visit. It now featured a second shop-sized room outfitted with tables.

Jarod had taken a table roughly in the middle of the second room.

Ethan sat and wondered if it was possible to be carsick when one was not actually in a car.

Poni arrived with their coffee and promised to be back with their sandwiches.

Jarod nodded and thanked her.

"We were in school together, actually," Poni mentioned, trying very hard to make it a mere passing comment.

Jarod looked into her face.

Poni smiled and bobbed a little. Ethan prayed that she didn't jump up and down on the spot. "Same grade!" she chimed, just as if it were a happy coincidence.

Ethan did not laugh, as much as he found the woman ill-mannered.

Jarod nodded. "I did not know that."

Poni snickered girlishly, or was that supposed some manner of giggle?

Ethan spotted an old woman eyeing them out of the corner of his eye. She took a seat at a table toward the farthest end of the room and by the window. From there she could watch their table, but what made Ethan most uncomfortable was that she could watch him.

Poni gasped and bobbed forward again. "Sunny!" She hurried away to attend the old woman.

Sunny watched her approach and then she frowned semi-critically. "Cute," she said blankly.

Poni bit her lip.

"I know who he is!" Sunny admonished with an almost smile. She tossed her head. "Coffee?"

Sunny tilted her head and fixed Poni with a look. Of course!

Poni crunched up her nose and hurried away again.

"Honey?" Sunny called her back.

Poni turned, blushing, and toddled back to the table.

Sunny pressed a note into her hand. "If Marvin stops in later on today just you treat him a coffee and one of those things from the-" she waved in indication of the cakes and other baked things, "there." Sunny shot her a sharp look. "Don't you be telling him any names now girl." She grinned. "Keep the change or shout yourself a piece of cake, slim thing you."

Poni beamed. She turned on the spot. "You like it?"

Sunny shook her head.

Poni strolled away to make Sunny that coffee.

Sunny settled back in her chair and smiled when she caught Ethan watching her.

* * *

"Marvin!" Poni's flighty voice announced in acute horror.

Sunny's eyes got big and she planted her hands over her mouth and slid a little lower in her chair. When she realized that wasn't going to work, she sat up straight and arranged her face into seeming unawareness.

There was some grumbling from the other room.

"You know what?" Poni cried. "It's on the house."

"It's what?"

"It's on the house," Poni said uncertainly.

Marvin hmmed. "What's that for then, girly?"

Poni half-winced at this address and gave two thumbs up. "Customer loyalty!" she chimed.

"Customer loyalty, 'ey?"

Poni smiled. "How about a nice piece of cake with your coffee?" she suggested.

Marvin looked at her with narrowed eyes.

"Go on," Poni encouraged in her best gentle voice.

Marvin tapped on the glass in indication of his choice.

"You just find yourself a table and I'll bring it out to you," Poni told him kindly.

* * *

Marvin was, at Ethan's best estimate, Sunny's age, and somewhat overweight. Marvin's little eyes scanned the room and then came to a rest upon Sunny, appearing for all the world as though she were thinking fondly upon a matter of some consideration.

Jarod frowned uncomfortably.

Marvin made a beeline for Sunny's table. "I sit here, ma'am?" he asked in what might have been an attempt at politeness.

Sunny suddenly and inexplicably looked up and noticed him standing there. "Marvin?" she said.

Marvin sat down and grinned. "You don't mind, ma'am?" he said cunningly.

Sunny opened her mouth. "No," she said, saving the breath she had been holding for a long explanation of her disapproval. She shook her head.

Poni nearly dropped the two coffee cups when she saw which table Marvin had chosen. She bobbed as though drawing courage and walked calmly to the table. She placed Sunny's coffee down in front of her. "Here you are."

"Thank you, honey," Sunny replied.

"Marvin," Poni said.

Marvin watched her as she placed his coffee down at the table, waiting to see if she spilled it into the saucer. When she did not he said, "You should get yourself a pretty piece of cake there, Sunny. 'S on the house." He turned and regarded Poni. "Ain't that right enough, girly? Regulars on the house?"

Poni smiled painfully. "Yes, sir."

Marvin grinned.

"Ah." Sunny's voice wavered. "I think I'll pass. I'm watching my waist," she said, placing a hand on her stomach.

Marvin looked at her but did not discern that she had been making any sort of ridicule against his condition. He chuckled. "Nonsense, woman!"

Poni stared at her, her eyes pleading.

Sunny sighed. "Oh, alright!" she burst, sending a smile in Marvin's direction as though to infer that he had convinced her. "The pineapple one."

Poni nodded and spun away from the table. Her eyes looked like saucers as she hurried across the room.

Ethan doubted that she even remembered that Jarod and he were also present in the room as she rushed past. He picked a corner off his sandwich and popped the piece of crust into his mouth with a grin.

* * *

Ethan and Jarod finished their sandwiches. Jarod stopped at the counter on the way out. Ethan paused, annoyed. "You were great," Jarod said. "Have a good day."

Poni laughed falteringly. "Nice try, but I don't think so." She smiled. "Thanks all the same," she said, and waved her fingers at Ethan.

Jarod grinned.

"Come again soon!" she called, leaning over the counter.

* * *

Jarod looked around at Ethan.

Ethan frowned, annoyed.

Jarod laughed.

Ethan crossed his arms. He knew what Jarod was thinking and he didn't think so. Poni did not have a thing for him.

* * *

The pair took a walk around town. Later they drove out to the lake out past the town limits that was in actual fact a dam.

Ethan stared at the two picnic tables, the plate announcing that some kid had drowned herself in the lake back in the 50s, a couple of signs. "Prime tourist attraction, this is!" he declared.

Jarod shot him a look.

Ethan looked away from him and trudged off toward the pier. "Dumb dumpy bumpkin village!"

* * *

Jarod drove out to the nearest neighbouring town, a good 50 minutes. When he returned to Misery it was past dark. He booked a motel room at the one motel in town and sat down with his laptop.

* * *

Jarod frowned and glanced across the room to where Ethan was sleeping. He shut his laptop and rubbed his face, tired. He lay back on his bed and stared up at the ceiling.

It wasn't really right, dragging Ethan to this place.

* * *

The little girl screamed. The stuffed penguin grew steadily closer. He landed with a flop and a dull thud behind the little girl. She spun abruptly and stooped to snatch the penguin.

Lyle smiled, patted her nose.

"Is he scared, daddy?" the little girl asked, dropping her three-year-old chin onto the stuffed penguin squashed to her chest.

Lyle looked at the sky for a moment, considering. "Nah," he said, only pretend serious.

The little girl made a face. She threw the penguin into the air and screamed, and then she smiled.

* * *

The little girl sat in the corner, knees drawn to her chest. Her penguin lay on the floor across the room. She gazed at the stuffed animal with her too big brown eyes, but did not move.

She seemed to come to a decision and pushed herself to her feet and ran to the penguin and snatched him up and squashed him. She ran the rest of the way to the bed and pulled herself up and crawled across the mattress.

"Sydney's scared," she said, hugging Lyle. "Daddy, don't. Please stop, daddy."

* * *

**If, by this point, you are worried – Do not read on!!! Thanks for reading!**


	2. Chapter 2

Ethan awoke. His head hurt. He sat up and pressed his palms into his eyes.

* * *

Ethan didn't drink his coffee. He stared blankly out onto the street.

Jarod sat across from him, busy eating his breakfast.

Ethan wasn't hungry.

* * *

The sky was mostly fine, just as the weather reporter had said. Ethan and Jarod trudged through rows of gravestones, Jarod in the lead and Ethan trailing behind at a lagging pace.

Jarod stopped before a slick black gravestone. Ethan read the name.

_James Edward 'Jimmy' Hooper_

_1959-1977_

The inscription that followed described how the gravestone had been funded by the community of Misery, almost ten years ago.

* * *

A woman laughed.

Ethan turned, startled, and immediately noted the woman's tan.

The woman widened her eyes as though in inference and moved forward to place her flowers at the gravestone.

Ethan stepped aside, keen to put a respectable distance between them, and Jarod did the same. Ethan thought that she thought they were tourists. Which they were.

* * *

"Did you know each other?" Jarod asked.

Ethan stared at him. What kind of a person said something like that?

The woman turned and met Jarod's gaze. "Same grade," she said and smiled.

Ethan frowned, troubled somewhat.

"You were in school together?" Jarod asked.

The woman tossed her head. "I know who you are," she said on her way past, "and I have nothing to say."

* * *

Ethan looked at Jarod. "Ouch," he said.

Jarod ignored him, annoyed, and followed the woman.

Ethan ran to catch him up.

* * *

"You're Hyacinth," Jarod said loudly, his boots crunching on the loose gravel.

The woman kept walking.

There were two cars parked by the cemetery entrance, one of which was Jarod's rental.

A boy sat in the passenger's side front seat of the second car, reading a book, the door wide open.

* * *

Jarod stared. Ethan turned. Jarod had noticed, the same as him, that the boy could have been Lyle's clone were it not for the tan. Ethan supposed he was at least 20.

* * *

"Poni," Jarod asked, "can I ask you a question?"

Poni watched him for a moment. "Sure."

"There was a woman at the cemetery today when we visited James's grave. Hyacinth. She had a boy with her. You wouldn't happen to know him, would you?"

"Oh," Poni said. "Him. Yeah. I know who you're talking about."

"Yeah?"

Poni grimaced.

"It's not a big town secret?"

Poni winced. "No. Yeah, his name is Lyle. They're friends."

Jarod frowned at the word, _friends_. "He's not her son?"

"Ah." Poni paused. "No."

Jarod nodded.

Poni refilled Ethan's coffee and hurried off.

* * *

"Who are you?"

Jarod turned sharply in his chair.

Sunny stood looking at him.

Jarod stuck out his hand. "Jarod. I'm Jarod."

Sunny took his hand briefly. She knew perfectly well who _he_ was. "Why are you here?"

"Ah," Ethan interrupted. "We're tourists."

Sunny regarded him.

He nodded.

* * *

In the afternoon Jarod decided that he should show Ethan Bobby's house so long as they were here.

It was a neat double-storey house, and even now, it looked neat, despite its age and lack of maintenance.

The garden was growing weeds and odd patches of dirt.

"This is it," Jarod said. "Of course, it's empty now."

Ethan could no more imagine this house than he could this town, could not imagine what it must have been like before.

He started for the gate.

"Ethan," Jarod called him back.

Ethan kept walking.

"Ethan, you can't-" He stomped after Ethan, annoyed.

* * *

Ethan would have liked to have said Catherine came to him in the afterlife and warned him; he would have liked to have said that he felt something. Instead, none of those things happened. He felt nothing.

* * *

It was just as Jarod had told him. There was nothing to be seen. The house was empty now.

He sat out on the back step and didn't see the weedy backyard. He was staring hard at nothing.

Jarod found him out there and sat down beside him. After some time, they drove back to the motel.

* * *

Lyle stared at the ceiling.

Ethan didn't know why he was having these dreams, but distantly he registered that his half brother was perhaps only in his middle twenties. He was older now, he knew. The world was older now.

He kissed his hand and touched the back of the little girl's hair, dark like his, asleep on his chest.

She was four this year.

He sat carefully to make sure she didn't wake.

Someone would come and in the morning she'd wake in the facility, and she'd be with the other children like herself, and she might even be angry enough to forget him.

She didn't wake and he didn't wait, and then he was gone and the world seemed to shift and here he was and there she was and nothing happened.

He looked at the penguin and the penguin looked at him with its lifeless gaze that never didn't look and he didn't know why he had taken it. Children at the farm didn't have parents, they weren't given toys. He didn't want her to have anything that would remind her of him, he supposed.

He blinked at the stupid tears in his eyes. The doctors would say that he didn't know how to feel things, that he was compensating what he thought he should feel, what he had observed was proper to feel.

He absently touched the beads he wore on his right wrist. It wasn't going to happen again, he decided sensibly.

* * *

It was dark, Ethan realised. He was awake. He struggled to remember the details of the dream he had been having, but it was as though a storm had come in, and clouds got in the way. He almost didn't remember what the dream had been about, except that he kept thinking how much the boy from the cemetery looked like his half brother.

* * *

**Home** by planet p

**Disclaimer** I don't own _the Pretender_ or any of its characters.


	3. Chapter 3

Cutter's was closed for the day Tuesday.

Poni appeared in the door behind the glass. She opened the door and invited them in in a clear voice. "Barbeque today," she explained.

Ethan didn't much care.

Jarod listened and nodded. "What's that for?" he asked, carrying a box she had passed him out to her car parked out back of the café. He placed the box beside the one she had carried and looked inside at the plates of sandwiches.

"The local cops are paying for it," Poni told him. "Some community awareness thing."

Jarod frowned.

Poni put on a gruff voice. "Don't do violence, kids, it's bad." She laughed at her own inventiveness. "I can drive you boys over."

"Yeah," Jarod said loudly. "Could do."

Poni grinned.

Nobody asked Ethan.

* * *

There were pamphlets and bags of things for the kids and a schedule of activities with guest speakers listed and all before 10am.

Ethan went along and did what Jarod did, which was helping with the setting up. He watched a Jumping Castle being blown up.

* * *

A boy yelled. "Why are you here?"

Ethan paused in what he was doing and spotted the boy from the cemetery yesterday: Lyle.

Lyle froze. "I'm helping," he said to the other boy.

"Don't you have, like, folk to be killing or something? Why don't you piss off and do that?" the boy said. The boy shoved him.

Jarod gave Ethan a look as he approached.

"Nice town," Ethan said.

Jarod nodded. He thought so.

"I won't be long," Ethan said. He walked away and left Jarod standing alone.

* * *

Ethan walked to the car park. He stepped around a car and found Lyle sitting with his arms crossed.

"You okay?" Ethan asked.

Lyle ignored him.

Ethan frowned, and then he noted the earphones underneath all of that scruffy hair, mp3 player hidden in his right hand.

Ethan reached out and touched his arm.

Lyle scrambled to his feet and backed away.

Ethan looked at him, eager to convey that he was not a threat.

Lyle took his earphones out and frowned. "I'm contemplating my homicidal thoughts," he said.

Ethan grinned.

Lyle looked away.

"You okay?" Ethan asked again.

"I guess," Lyle said blankly.

* * *

Jarod eyed the boy, careful to disguise his distrust.

"I'm Lyle," the boy said.

Ethan nodded. He picked a triangle of sandwich from a paper plate Poni had brought over earlier. "So where are your parents?"

Lyle looked at him. "Dead," he said in that same blank voice he had used earlier. "I guess."

Ethan frowned.

* * *

Jarod and Ethan helped Poni pack her things away and Poni introduced them to her daughter. Theresa was a slim scrap of a girl with light brown hair and brown eyes.

* * *

**Home** by planet p

**Disclaimer** I don't own _the Pretender_ or any of its characters.


	4. Chapter 4

**This chapter's kinda graphic.**

**

* * *

**

Theresa walked, her shoes scraping on the pavement. She missed her friend. Her friend and her had worked together at the local supermarket, serving the registers and stocking shelves.

Now Lyle worked her friend's register.

* * *

Theresa stopped at the counter to say _hi_ to her mom. She walked into the other room with a milkshake a few minutes later and dropped into a chair and said nothing.

* * *

Jarod perused his laptop with his satellite internet card that plugged into a portal in the side of his laptop.

Ethan leant across the table. "What are we doing about this Hyacinth woman?" he asked.

Jarod did not respond.

"Jarod?"

Jarod finally tore himself away from his laptop screen and looked at Ethan, annoyed.

Ethan watched him with expectant eyes.

"Well I thought she made it pretty clear where she stood in relations to me and you, don't you think?"

Ethan sighed as though he had to think about it, or it was tiresome to him. "Oooh…" he said, as though to contest. He sighed shortly, acutely annoyed.

Jarod returned his eyes pointedly to his laptop.

Ethan stood up out of his chair.

"Where are you going?" Jarod asked, not looking up.

"Out."

Jarod fixed him with a stare. "Where are you going?"

"I thought I'd have a look around. See if they have an antique store in this dump."

Jarod frowned momentarily.

Ethan smiled and walked out. He didn't stop to ask Poni about antique stores on his way out. He didn't stop at all.

* * *

There was no antique store. Not even a small bric-a-brac collection.

* * *

Later, Jarod drove the 50 minutes into the next town and he and Ethan had a look around the hospital, various clinics and medical practices and rooms, scoping out if any had been around long enough to be familiar with Bobby.

The medical records the FBI had obtained seemed hardly adequate, Jarod explained. For instance, Bobby had never come in sick with the flu, there was no record of any behavioural problems ever being discussed. Basically, all Jarod and the FBI had were the records the school had kept and that was it. The school had listed a Dr. Hooper as Bobby's regular doctor, who Jarod had been informed was Jimmy's father, Misery's only doctor back in those days, and now they had none, and the FBI could not place Dr. Hooper.

"I don't get it," Ethan said, glancing across at Jarod, who was frowning.

"I think he'd been denying it for a long time," Jarod told him. "James was going to move north to live with a relative so that he could go to law school after he graduated. I don't know what he thought, but I don't think he thought that his son was dead, that he'd been dead all that time. He might have even thought he'd met a girl. It seems the likeliest explanation."

Ethan laughed shortly. "Come on! How could he not know?"

"Perhaps he didn't want to know. Perhaps he preferred to think that although they had lost contact, his son was still alive and maybe even had a family out there."

Ethan shook his head. Somehow he didn't think Jarod was going to be stumbling across those medical records any time soon.

* * *

Lyle Bowman stood at the bottom of a set of stairs, contemplating the walk up to the top floor of the house, when his hand was lifted off the railing and he turned to see who had done so.

Bobby gazed at him steadily with his blue eyes.

Lyle noted the uniform and realized that he was back from school at this hour. He stood away from the staircase and grabbed the boy's hair in his fist and smacked him into the wall.

Bobby watched him with those big eyes.

Lyle frowned and yanked his head back and kissed him. His lip tasted like blood where he'd bitten it when he'd backed him into the wall.

* * *

Bobby was taking off his clothes, and as he did, his eyes never left Lyle's own.

Lyle didn't like waiting.

When Bobby was done, he grabbed his arms and pressed his back to the wall, and although Bobby had enough bruises to open up a shop, most of them from a belt, he didn't show the least sign of discomfort.

* * *

The sound of breathing heavy, Lyle stopped to collect himself, and let Bobby down from the wall.

Bobby lowered his eyes from his and rubbed his arms and shoulders under his shirt as though he thought him cold. He planted a kiss along his collarbone, and another, and another.

Lyle shivered.

He took Bobby's arm and stamped to his study and plopped him down in his chair. Bobby watched him beneath his fringe and Lyle decided that the boy needed a haircut. He planted himself on top of the boy and pushed his head back and kissed him.

Bobby held him and his bitten fingers and one sticky plaster scrabbled to pull him closer, his breath hot in Lyle's throat.

* * *

Bobby stood in the hall, his back against the wall, and waited as Lyle buttoned up his shirt and pants and fixed his collar in the other room. He stared at the wall opposite but there was nothing to see.

Lyle emerged from his study and pulled the door shut behind him. The door was locked now.

Bobby wheeled around and Lyle caught him looking at him as he turned away from the door.

Bobby grinned and dropped his hands to his pants. He unzipped the fly and slipped his hands inside.

When that was done, Lyle fixed his zip, and said, "I'm going."

He walked to the front door and was gone.

Bobby stood alone in the hall, his chest heaving.

* * *

Ethan grabbed the basin and was sick. He kept thinking about Bobby's eyes and his eyes said _I love you_. He had never seen his half brother look at anyone that way before.

He was sick again, and his hands hurt from gripping the basin. His chest heaved painfully and he couldn't catch his breath for wanting to be sick. Any moment now it was going to be his intestines.

He tried to stop from being sick long enough to reach for the tap and then it hit him that his hands shouldn't be this sore, and then he remembered how he had been gripping the mattress and threw up again.

* * *

**Home** by planet p

**Disclaimer** I don't own _the Pretender_ or any of its characters.


	5. Chapter 5

Ethan stared at his coffee and he wanted to be sick all over again. He had managed not to be sick in the car, but now here he was, and his eyes had gone shiny from forcing himself not to throw up. He prayed Jarod didn't notice. He should have prayed on Poni too.

She placed a hand on his arm and gazed at him and he thought he saw something of what might have been worry. She hurried off then, before he could say anything, and returned with a glass of water.

"I'm afraid it's going around," she told him, perhaps thinking he was taken with the flu.

He drank his water and said nothing. His head hurt from being sick.

"I've paracetamol if you'd like," she offered.

Ethan nodded and his head hurt all the more. He thought vaguely that he would have been better off getting blind drunk.

Poni pressed two pills into his hand and handed him the card for later. One had to keep these things up or it would never work.

* * *

Jarod looked at him and frowned.

"He'll be right in no time," Poni said, straightening up, and smoothed the hair out of Ethan's face with a hand, standing behind him.

Ethan would normally have managed an annoyed look, but he didn't mind right now. He found himself thinking on that first day and not minding if it happened to be true that Poni had a little bit of a thing for him, although he knew it wasn't.

"You'll see," Poni assured Jarod, and turned and walked away, taking her hand with her.

Ethan looked at him. He'd wanna be careful he didn't catch it.

* * *

Jarod and Ethan visited a few of the viable options for doctors who might have known Bobby and Jarod had a look that Ethan supposed was normal for him when he was in the zone. This thought made him smile momentarily but his head still hurt.

He hung around a drinks machine for a moment and got himself a Coke so as to swallow his paracetamol.

* * *

Around lunchtime, Theresa came in to Cutter's, and sat in a back room to eat her packed sandwich with her legs crossed and a romance novel.

* * *

Jarod and Ethan had lunch at a roadhouse where trucks stopped to refuel and catch up on sleep and get something to eat.

Jarod had decided that it would be a good idea, after lunch, to start to have a talk to some people.

Ethan didn't share the same opinion of a good idea as Jarod.

* * *

Jarod talked to a doctor. The doctor looked at him. Jarod said that he was a detective and that he was investigating as part of an ongoing investigation. It was best just to check on these things every now and again, see if any new evidence, any new lead, came to light.

Nothing changed.

Jarod said goodbye and left.

Ethan looked at him, but Jarod wasn't talking just now.

* * *

There was another doctor who threatened to call the police and have the two of them removed.

Jarod started to explain that that wasn't necessary, then he left.

"Didn't the FBI talk to any of these people?" Ethan asked.

"There are no records of any such meetings."

* * *

Jarod had to choose another parking space after Ethan pointed out that it was a Permit Only Zone. A look of annoyance crossed his face but he remained silent.

The hospital wasn't like the hospitals Ethan was used to, but he supposed that that might have had something to do with the population.

Jarod asked at the general reception. The woman behind the counter didn't move until Jarod showed her his badge.

"Ah, I'm a Federal Agent," he said.

The woman seemed to unfreeze. She was in her early twenties and looked as though she had rendered her face. "I'll just-" She hurried away without finishing what it was she was just going to do.

An older man returned with her and asked them to step into a room where they could sit down and have a chat.

* * *

The man looked old enough to have known Bobby, Ethan thought, as the man introduced himself. He wasn't a doctor.

Jarod's frowning was starting to give Ethan a headache.

The man finally asked them to please wait here and hurried away, quite like the woman. Ethan supposed that they all came out of a factory out of the ground.

* * *

The old man brought another man with him who he said was a doctor but was retired and occasionally stopped by as his granddaughter worked in administration for the hospital.

Jarod nodded respectfully.

* * *

"I had met Bobby, yes," the doctor said.

"Can you tell me the reason for this meeting, Dr. Kessler?"

Dr. Kessler nodded. "I don't see why not," he said. "Bobby had taken a lot of sleeping pills and he wasn't very well. You can imagine."

"And what did you think of all this?"

"He was six. They were his mother's sleeping pills. She said she didn't know how it'd happened."

"Did you ask Bobby about what happened?"

"We set him up with a counsellor. His parents were obviously present. The father wasn't very happy but the mother seemed strangely- She seemed strange."

"What do you mean?"

"Bobby was a difficult kid. I mean, I'm sure it was the shock. I just thought she was disappointed somehow. For one moment, on the way out to the parking lot, our paths crossed, and she looked at me, and I thought, _Gee_."

"Disappointed?"

Dr. Kessler frowned. "Don't get me wrong, detective, but I think it was a little too much for her. The counsellor had gotten it into his head that the kid had meant to make himself sick and that it had been a ploy for attention and that the kid really didn't care if he died or not. The mother was understandably upset."

Jarod nodded. "It all seems a little extreme, don't you think, doctor?"

Dr. Kessler sighed. "Bobby was an odd kid. We all knew he was either very dumb or very smart. He was always watching what was happening. Calculating, the counsellor thought. Nothing god damn came close to touching him. That from the counsellor, not me."

Jarod jotted this down.

"Of course, it was just the one time," Dr. Kessler finished.

Jarod nodded. He understood.

There were some words exchanged, they shook hands, they came, they left.

* * *

The drive back to Misery was silent. There had been no other doctors who had known Bobby. It was just the one time, as Dr. Kessler had said.

* * *

Jarod had a coffee at Cutter's.

Ethan looked across at him. This was Jarod, he reminded himself, not some Pretend. He supposed Jarod might have been angry.

Ethan got up and walked to the counter.

Poni was busy attending a group of kids out of school, each holding an ice-cream or a popsicle. She leant across the counter to give one of the kids their change. "You go on and behave yourselves now, and be sure and enjoy your ice things. You know where we are tomorrow."

They filed out the door loudly, kicking or shoving or shouting just to show how they could not behave.

Poni shook her head and laughed, and then she noticed Ethan. She let her breath out and leant her arms on the counter.

"Ah, I'm fine," Ethan told her automatically, which caused her to frown. "I mean, I wanted to talk," he said quickly.

Poni nodded, not quite believing him yet.

Ethan stared down at the sweets behind the glass, some in glass jars, plastic jars, some in cardboard trays or boxes, and all very colorful and very sugary. "Did Bobby have a girlfriend, Poni?"

Poni did not reply.

Ethan lifted his eyes and saw that she was staring. "Ah, yeah," she said. "I suppose he did."

"It wasn't-?"

Poni laughed. "No." It wasn't her.

Ethan frowned.

"You'd be wanting Hyacinth, I reckon," Poni told him.

Ethan touched her hand.

She peered into his face. "Looks like you're over the worst of it now," she said. "And a good thing, that, too." She smiled.

Ethan managed a smile in return and Poni had a little customer. Ethan walked back into the other room.

* * *

"So it turns out Hyacinth was Bobby's girlfriend," Ethan said in Jarod's ear.

Jarod brushed a hand past his ear.

Ethan squeezed into his chair by the window and waited for Jarod to speak.

Jarod didn't.

"Jarod?"

"Busy, Ethan," Jarod said dismissively.

Ethan glowered. He finished his cold coffee and stomped off back to the counter to return the mug to Poni.

* * *

"Kitchen's out back," Poni told him, a hand over the phone, and flattened herself against the wall although she needn't have.

Ethan slipped past her and into the hall. He stepped into the kitchen and placed the mug in the sink with a resounding chink.

He turned and came face to face with Poni.

She started to back away, but Ethan kissed her.

"Shit. I'm sorry."

Poni grimaced. "You're right," she said.

He turned and watched her at the sink. "I'm sorry."

Poni breathed loudly. She turned around, leaning back again the sink. "I know," she told him.

Ethan stepped away from her, then he rushed out of the room, back into the hall, back behind the counter, and out the door.

* * *

Ethan headed for the far end of town, the way Jarod and he had come. He didn't mean to leave, he just needed to walk. He spotted a small park, sandwiched in between a dead shop and another dead shop, he supposed. He didn't stop.

A block from the park, a shop sign read: CORNER STORE. He stopped. He didn't want to buy anything, he didn't even want to go inside, but that didn't mean he wasn't going to.

Hyacinth's car was parked out front of the corner store.

Ethan cut across the hot road.

* * *

The door gave a little jingle. Hyacinth looked up from the counter. She knew who he was.

Ethan took a casual stroll up to the counter. If she was waiting for him to say something, he thought he ought to indulge her. "That must have sucked!"

Hyacinth didn't respond.

He noted the picture frame beside the register and flipped it around. The photograph showed three teenagers. The girl standing in the middle with the braces in her mouth was Hyacinth. The boy with the scruffy hair was Bobby, and he recognized Jimmy from a photograph Jarod had showed him once. "Cute," he said, replacing the frame.

Hyacinth glared.

He grinned. He wasn't going to believe that she hadn't known. "No, you knew alright," he said, as though she was clever but not clever enough.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Hyacinth said firmly.

"Your boyfriend was gay!" Ethan shot in false exasperation.

Three stone snails stood in a row on the cash register. They were all the same black. There was a father and a mother and a baby which was smaller.

Ethan looked up and met Hyacinth's gaze.

"Bobby wasn't gay."

Ethan clicked his tongue. "Bzz!"

"Yeah, he kissed Jimmy," Hyacinth said in a level voice. Ethan had the impression she wanted to get this said. "That doesn't mean he was gay."

Ethan shot her a winning smile. "Thank you, Hyacinth! What do you know - you learn something new every day!" He scrunched up his nose. "I did not know that. Thank you."

Hyacinth was confused.

"I'm a psychic – not Jesus Fucking Christ Superstar!"

Hyacinth stared.

Ethan thought in the back of his mind that he might have offended her or at least unsettled her and hoped that he had.

Hyacinth dropped her head onto the counter and laughed and laughed.

Ethan froze.

"Jesus Fucking Christ Superstar!" she cried. "I'm calling the cops!" She lifted her head up off the counter and she was smiling but her eyes were shining and she meant it.

Ethan leapt forward. "No!"

Hyacinth punched a number into the telephone pad.

Ethan hung up on her. "I want to stop Lyle from hurting anyone ever again."

Hyacinth narrowed her eyes. "What do you mean?"

"Lyle- Mr. Bowman."

Hyacinth shook her head. "I want you to leave."

Ethan looked at her.

"Go."

He left.

* * *

"Wait!"

He had heard the bell above the door, but he waited before he turned.

Hyacinth stood there, and she was crying, but she wasn't moving because she was watching him.

He looked at her. She had really cared about Bobby.

* * *

A car honked from the road and Ethan swore. "Shit!" He turned and glowered.

Jarod stared at him. What was he doing?

Ethan ignored him.

Jarod honked again.

* * *

Jarod pulled the car up in front of the corner store, slammed the door, and walked up to the pair.

"He hates that they invented road rules," Ethan joked about Jarod.

Jarod did not look happy.

"It's okay," Ethan told Hyacinth, a hand on her arm.

Jarod stood there and watched this exchange. Ethan had never been big on comfort. Charles always said that Ethan would find a girl and then he wouldn't be able to stop touching her. Jarod had never thought so.

* * *

Hyacinth had stopped crying and looked as though she was feeling a bit better.

Ethan decided to take her for dinner at the local hotel with Jarod and himself and Jarod had driven them all over there in the rental.

The hotel served meals for an hour between 6pm and 7pm.

They didn't talk at all if truth be told, but it didn't matter.

* * *

**Home** by planet p

**Disclaimer** I don't own _the Pretender_ or any of its characters.


	6. Chapter 6

Ethan blinked his eyes open and light streamed in. It was day.

* * *

"What did you tell Hyacinth yesterday?" Jarod asked.

Ethan looked at him. "It was mostly just her crying."

Jarod handed him a folder. Ethan frowned and flipped the folder open. It was the FBI report.

* * *

Ethan spied Sunny sitting in a far corner and made his way through the various tables. He took a seat opposite her and looked into her face.

Sunny watched him.

"Sunny, do you remember a man? He visited Bobby between 1975 and 1977. He was a doctor, a psychiatrist."

Sunny frowned. "I remember," she said.

Ethan straightened. "Do you know why he was visiting Bobby?"

Sunny dropped her eyes to the table. "He was going to fix Bobby." Sunny smiled.

"You're upset," Ethan observed.

Sunny blinked at the silly tears in her eyes. "I'm not going to tell you that I'm fine, because I'm not."

"Sunny, you're going to have to say something. I can't read minds."

Sunny laughed briefly. "His school reports. Bad grades. Disruptive, argumentative. It was a suspected attention/hyperactive disorder. He bit his fingers. It was a nervous condition. It was an inability to connect socially, a reluctance to engage in social settings and situations, sudden violent outbursts or withdrawal. Mood swings. It was a failure to understand social situations and comprehend feelings. It was epilepsy. Diabetes. Was it autism or mental retardation?" She held a hand to her head. "It was never – look at Bobby. He's not green. He doesn't have antennae. What, he's _human_?"

"Bobby was epileptic?" Ethan asked, remembering the dream he had had of Lyle and his daughter.

Sunny nodded.

Ethan grasped her hand. "Thank you, Sunny."

Sunny shook her head.

* * *

Jarod frowned, listening to Ethan go on. He didn't know that he believed all that.

And then Ethan said. "Bobby and his father were lovers."

Jarod stared.

"Catherine- she-" Ethan didn't meet his eyes. He watched the motel wall instead. "She told me."

* * *

Ethan was confused. It had always made sense before. Lyle Bowman was domineering and abusive. Raines was manipulative. Now nothing made sense.

* * *

"Elsie Bowman was a hairdresser," Jarod said a long time later.

Ethan hadn't been timing.

"We should think about questioning co-workers, friends. She attended church two times a week. Sunday morning, Monday afternoon. Perhaps she was a member of a club, an association? Did she visit the library?"

Ethan nodded. He told himself he had done the right thing telling Jarod.

Jarod stood by the door, and then he didn't.

* * *

Ethan understood what Jarod was trying to do. He needed now to establish whether or not Lyle Bowman had beat his wife, whether or not it was possible he had beaten Bobby too. And what was Bobby's role in all this?

Ethan remembered the bruises. He wanted to be sick. Nasty bedroom games.

* * *

There was one woman. She was alive, Jarod said.

Elsie Bowman had not frequented the library. She had, however, attended church, and Bingo on Sunday, Ethan said.

That was the plan.

* * *

The woman still lived in Misery, might never have lived anywhere else. Both house and front yard were badly maintained.

"I remember her," the woman said. She sat in an armchair in her lounge, a mid-morning talk show airing on the television.

Jarod tried not to look at the television. "You worked together?"

"We did work together. We were not friends."

"Did you ever meet her husband, Mrs. Reed?"

"He was a bank manager. Personally, I never got what he saw in her. She was plain." She considered. "He was real nice. She got lucky with that one, I can tell you. Got her off her old man's farm, that's for sure."

Jarod nodded.

Mrs. Reed sighed. "He bought her a car. She had her own car, did you know? You should have seen what she lived in!"

"I have seen," Jarod said.

Mrs. Reed eyed him. "But I guess you can't have it all. Just look at that lunatic son of hers! And a murderer too." She shook her head.

* * *

Ethan fell back on the motel bed. He had been to visit a VIP of the Bingo Society. "Bingo killed me! I'm dead."

Jarod laughed. "Nothing new from Mrs. Reed." He shook his head.

It was time for lunch.

* * *

"His name was Raines."

Ethan's chin shot up at the mention of the name.

Sunny stood behind Jarod's chair.

Jarod turned so that he could look at her.

"The psychiatrist."

Jarod scrawled this down for Sunny's benefit.

Sunny nodded.

* * *

"She knew his name?" Jarod said, trying to understand how that had happened.

"It's a small town," Ethan reminded him.

* * *

Jarod was thinking about what Sunny had said. He was thinking about Raines. Ethan had seen that look before and that was his the-world-is-sinister look.

Ethan really thought that they should talk to Hyacinth, and then he thought that perhaps he should talk to her, alone.

* * *

Back at the motel, Jarod passed Ethan another folder.

Ethan looked at him questioningly.

Jarod opened himself a can of cherry-flavoured soda.

Ethan stared at the photographs. All women, all Asian. All dead.

* * *

It was all really chance. Later he told her that he lived in Virginia and that he was in town for business.

"My god, it's your birthday and you look so unhappy!" he said.

She laughed.

He could see in her eyes that she didn't know yet.

She stopped laughing. It had come to her.

"Let me buy you a cappuccino," he said, remembering that she'd always had cappuccino.

Elsie shook her head, a hand on her forehead. She surprised him. "Something alcoholic."

So he did.

He told her that she looked good. He lied. She was old. She looked the same, plus thirty odd years.

She laughed. Not yet, the laugh said, she doesn't trust you yet.

She had another drink, and they trudged outside and she lit a cigarette. Then she looked across at him and told him she was having a party. He was invited if he wanted to come.

He laughed, but didn't touch her. Yes, he would come.

* * *

She took him back to her place. The young woman was Tammy, her daughter. Tammy eyed him, uncertain. "Tammy, a new friend."

He extended a hand by way of greeting. "Lou." He hadn't meant to lie.

Elsie laughed.

Tammy shook his hand.

* * *

She was pressed against the wall opposite him in the small passage. She confessed that she'd lied. She hadn't had anything planned.

He knew how to fix that. He told her that he was inviting her and Tammy to dinner at an expensive restaurant, and she would just have to recommend one such restaurant. He'd just come in and he knew none of the restaurants.

Elsie laughed. She knew a place.

* * *

They returned to Elsie's place and Elsie took him to her bedroom. He looked into her face and they fucked and Elsie slept.

He left her sleeping. He looked up and saw Tammy in the door.

She looked at him with secret eyes. Tammy told him that she'd been out buying wine. Her face fell. "Oh shit! Mom's asleep, isn't she?"

She was. "She is," he told her.

He poured her a glass of wine.

She asked what kind of work he did.

He lied.

They finished the bottle.

He fucked her too.

* * *

**Home** by planet p

**Disclaimer** I don't own _the Pretender_ or any of its characters.


	7. Chapter 7

Ethan's eyes hurt. He had slept too long. His back hurt. He remembered the dream. How old was Tammy? 30?

God! Why was he even having these dreams?

Jarod was talking. Ethan realised he wasn't talking to him, but to his cell phone.

* * *

The man might have been considered handsome in his younger days. These days he was a 70 something not yet retired. He wore an expensive suit under which he had retained the broad-shoulders of his youth. He was a psychiatrist, of course.

He sat in a large office with light grey flooring, considered spacious by its uncluttered design and its level floor.

His real name was Lou. He was unmarried.

Lou worked with Lyle.

* * *

"Ethan?"

Ethan straightened uncomfortably and squinted. He'd fallen asleep.

Jarod's frowning face swum into view. "Are you alright? You shouldn't be tired how much you slept yesterday."

Ethan rubbed a palm in his eye. "I think I've still got this flu thing."

Concern flashed across Jarod's face.

Ethan blinked.

* * *

Jarod returned with a Styrofoam cup and coffee, and the pair stepped out of Cutter's onto the grubby pavement.

Ethan squinted against the harsh daylight.

Jarod sighed. He turned his head and regarded Ethan. "You need to talk to Hyacinth."

Ethan frowned.

"Get it done."

* * *

"Do you think Bobby killed Jimmy?"

Hyacinth studied Ethan from across the table.

"I'm sorry, but I need to know where you stand."

"I don't know," Hyacinth admitted.

Ethan looked away from her. "Has Bobby ever tried to contact you in any way?"

"No."

"You've not met him again since 1977?"

"No."

Ethan turned back, met her eyes. "Would you tell me if you had?"

Hyacinth fought to keep her voice level. "Yes."

Ethan frowned.

"He needs help." Hyacinth paused. "Real help," she said.

Ethan nodded once. He trusted her. For now.

"I want to know what you're not telling me," Hyacinth said suddenly.

"I-"

Her voice stumbled. "I've nothing to tell you if I can't trust you."

"What did you think of Lyle Bowman?"

Hyacinth snorted. "I was no fan."

"We believe that Bobby's father physically abused him. Beat him."

Hyacinth rubbed her face.

Ethan sighed. "Bobby-"

Hyacinth shook her head. "Don't excuse him!" she said loudly.

Ethan wanted to tell her he hadn't been about to. Bobby hadn't told her. He kept silent.

She rubbed at her face again. "We were going to run away. We were going to take Jimmy's pick-up and run away."

Ethan frowned.

Hyacinth couldn't make herself face him. "I guess I always thought of Bobby as my friend." She laughed and pressed her hands into her eyes to stop from crying. "It wasn't planned or anything. I can't believe I told Bobby."

* * *

_Jimmy had a pick-up. Hyacinth would whine and whine and punch him in the arm but he would never let her ride with him in it._

_But then one day, after school, he called out that he was going to teach her to drive, and she smacked Bobby in the arm as if to say "Be seeing you" and ran across the road before Jimmy changed his mind._

_He winced when she crunched the gears and her legs were almost too short for the pedals, but she didn't care because she was having so much fun. He took her to some back road where she couldn't do much damage, and let her practice her driving there._

_Jimmy put his hand on her leg and sighed. "Look, Hyacinth-" Hyacinth braked – he nearly smacked his head out on the windshield – and looked across at him, "I guess what I'm trying to say is-" He sighed again. "We're friends right?"_

_Hyacinth grinned, widening her eyes. He was letting her drive his pick-up. Sure they were friends! "Yeah!"_

"_I guess what I'm trying to say is- I care for you, Hyacinth." He seemed relieved, having said it._

_Hyacinth punched him in the arm. "Yeah." She laughed._

_He leant across and kissed her. The laughter died._

* * *

Hyacinth turned around, her hands shaking. "I was stupid."

Ethan reached out a hand for her arm.

"Jimmy was his friend!" Hyacinth buried her head in Ethan's shoulder.

Ethan patted her back uncertainly. He wanted to tell her it wasn't her fault. "Hyacinth, Bobby and his father were involved, sexually."

Hyacinth's chin shot up. "What?" Her eyes shone horribly.

"Do you know what a sociopath is?"

Hyacinth's lip shook. She didn't understand what he was saying.

Ethan touched her arm. "There is no help for Bobby. I'm sorry."

Hyacinth shook her head. She didn't want to believe him.

"Bobby didn't love you. It wasn't about you. It was about Jimmy."

Hyacinth sobbed uselessly.

"He had to be in control."

* * *

"Now we know what Bobby had against Jimmy."

Jarod glanced up from his laptop. It wasn't safe to stay in one place too long. It was even less safe to re-visit places he had been before.

"Jimmy did his girlfriend. His girlfriend told him."

Jarod blinked.

"They were going to run away. After they stole Jimmy's car."

"I'd say that's adequate motive."

* * *

They packed the car. Jarod backed the car out of the parking space, turned out of the parking lot. He slammed the brakes on.

Lyle ran around the car. He made a face. "I wanna come with you."

Jarod frowned. He'd nearly been run over.

Lyle stared, his eyes wide in expectancy.

Jarod almost drove off and left him standing there. He tossed his head to the back door.

* * *

She was sitting in the corner, head on her knees, arms around her thin legs. She was crying.

Lyle turned. Blubbery tears ran down his face.

She lifted her face at the sound. She saw that he saw, and cried even harder.

"_What's wrong_?" he asked in Japanese.

She sobbed.

He walked to her and touched her knee. "_What's wrong?_"

She told him. "_I can't find my friend. I think something bad has happened to her. I can't find her._" She didn't see the blood. She didn't see the eyes. She sniffed. "_Why are you crying?_"

"_I'm not,_" he said.

She didn't believe him. She could see that he was. "_Yes you are!_"

"_I have allergies_," he said.

She made a face, and burst into tears again.

* * *

He saw the blood. He saw the eyes.

_What a dumb thing to do,_ he thought.

He needed to bloody eat something. He needed to fix the damn cut in his hand.

He left, shut the door behind him.

* * *

Ethan rubbed his face irritably, and then he remembered Lyle. He turned in his seat and frowned at the sleeping boy, then he looked at Jarod.

Jarod did not turn.

* * *

**Home** by planet p

**Disclaimer** I don't own _the Pretender_ or any of its characters.

**

* * *

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**Author's Note **There's part of a sequel I wrote a while ago. What do you think?

* * *

**Flames welcome! Thank you for reading!**


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